Shrine of Flaming Capitalism

Egypt’s Morsi and Military Partner for Power

Dear Readers: To celebrate Advent this year, I am planning to feature some of my favorite Christmas-time pieces over the next few weeks. The Young Prince lead the procession in Mass today, which is the first day of Advent. O Come, O Come Emmanuel was being sung by the choir…so I thought this would be a good choice to kick off the season:

The prince also starting opening up his chocolate Advent calendar yesterday.

Yesterday, Obama-approved Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood president Mohammed Morsi declared that he would have a referendum on December 15 to greenlight the newly rammed-through draft constitution that enshrines Shariah law in Egypt. Morsi has bought the support of the military via the new constitution, which prevents the military from having any civilian oversight, and allows the military to prosecute civilians.

Now Muslim Brotherhood protesters have shut down the Egyptian Supreme Court, forcing them to postpone their ruling on the legitimacy of the constitutional assembly that originally ratified the new constitution.

So much for the Arab Spring. The Muslim Brotherhood has now reached a compromise solution with the army that makes both of them unanswerable within the country. And the Obama administration remains silent.

As a result, Egypt’s opposition groups are planning to march on the Presidential Palace (via Egypt Daily News).

Several Egyptian political parties and groups have issued a joint statement announcing their intention to peacefully march to the presidential palace in Cairo at 5pm on Tuesday to voice opposition to President Mohamed Morsi’s recent decisions and the date that has been set for a nationwide popular referendum on Egypt’s draft constitution.

“The constitution project that Morsi wants to put before a referendum is in fact a project for tying down the political, civil, social and economic freedoms of Egyptians,” read the statement, published on the Egyptian Popular Current’s official Facebook page.

In a nutshell: Morsi gets complete freedom to enact extreme Islamic law, and the Egyptian military gets complete freedom to take care of themselves and handle the civilian population as it pleases. What’s not to love???